Introduction
Sugarcane …show more content…
Soaked bagasse weighing about 1kg was packed into plastic bags and either autoclaved at 120˚C for 20 minutes or steam pasteurized (using open flame) at 100˚C for 1 hour. It was allowed to cool to room temperature. Cool bagasse weighing 150g was aseptically transferred into a plastic mushroom bottle (850mls capacity) and inoculated with Pleurotus Ostreatus or Pleurotus Citrinopileatus at the rate of 2% (w/w). Inoculated bagasse was incubated for 0, 50, 85 and 120 days. The incubation temperature was left to fluctuate naturally. A 30-minute-interval daily record of temperature and humidity was taken using thermo-recorder (TR-72U made by T&D). At the end of each incubation period, the spent substrate was dried in an oven at 60˚C for 48 hours to stop fungal growth. It was ground to pass through 0.75mm sieve (Retch SM 2000 Cutting Mill). Nutritive value was analyzed using enzymatic method described by Abe et al. (1979) to determine organic cell contents (OCC), organic cell wall (OCW) divided into highly digestible part (Oa) and the lignified portion (Ob) and compared to raw bagasse as control. The data was analyzed using the general linear model of SAS (9.4) in a full factorial design. When significant differences occurred, means were separated by the Turkey-Kramer …show more content…
On dry matter basis, raw bagasse (control) contained 92.5, 8.9, 78.6 and 5.2% OM, OCC, Ob and Oa, respectively. Bagasse was either pasteurized or autoclaved (on day 0). Percentage changes in the composition of OCC, Ob and Oa due to autoclaving were 6.5, -10.6, 0.71%, respectively. The changes in composition due to pasteurization were 18.8, -3.13, 20.2% (for OCC, Ob and Oa), respectively. After 120 days of incubation, the changes in OCC, Ob and Oa of autoclaved bagasse were 40.5, -7.9 and 49.7% whereas for pasteurized bagasse it was 44.0, -10.6 and 77.5%, respectively. At 85 and 120 days of incubation, changes in the composition of OCC, Ob and Oa were not significantly different between pre-treatment method and species of white rot fungi. However, at day 50, OCC increase was higher in pasteurized bagasse (p=0.008) whereas Oa was higher in autoclaved bagasse